The man who allegedly killed a Justin Timberlake fan outside a Burbank radio station where the ‘NSYNC star was interviewed Monday night has been charged with murder.
Cameron Duty, 21, appeared in Pasadena Superior Court on Wednesday, the same day family and friends held a memorial for Anna White on what would have been her 22nd birthday.
Duty, who allegedly backed his pickup truck over a stop sign and struck White before dragging her more than a block, was not charged with hit-and-run or drunk driving as police had earlier expected. He will be arraigned September 26.
Ed Tolmas, who is defending Duty, is still reviewing the case and would not comment on what plea Duty will enter.
While investigators have said Duty did not know White and did not intend to hit her, White’s best friend, who took her to KIIS-FM for an early birthday present, suggested otherwise.
“To get up to the speed he was going in that distance, he would have had to have floored it,” Kelli Wolfe said. “Her back was turned. She was on her cell phone. She didn’t know what hit her.”
Duty, who is being held on $1 million bail, pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge of exhibition of speed in 1998 and served eight days in jail, according to court records.
Wolfe said Duty was outside the radio station making fun of Timberlake’s fans. “We thought he had serious anger-management issues,” she said. “He was being obnoxious and screaming and yelling at people. We said, ‘Why are you here? This isn’t an anger thing. We’re happy.’ And he was like, ‘I have every right to be here,’ being rude. A lot of people were saying they wanted to call the cops.”
White first told Wolfe she did not want to go to the radio station because she had homework, but later thanked her friend for taking her and said she was having a great time.
The victim had met Timberlake and shook his hand at a club one night, Wolfe said.
“She wasn’t one of those people who was like, ‘Oh my God,’ going to cry when she saw him,” Wolfe explained. “She was really down to earth…. We weren’t there to catch a glimpse of him. She’s seen him. It was so that we could hang around with other people that loved him.”
On Wednesday, Wolfe and others brought a birthday cake to the site of the incident and sang “Happy Birthday” to their late friend. Others – including policemen, firemen and nurses at the hospital where White was pronounced dead – stopped by throughout the day.
“I’m blown away by how many people are coming by and lighting candles and bringing flowers,” Wolfe said. “She touched so many people’s lives. She was a living, breathing angel and I’m proud to have been able to know her.”
